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Jewish Journal

Connect. Inform. Inspire.

May 2, 2002

Israelis in Orange County

Leave a Comment / Community, Orange County /

Violence in Israel, instead of creating community among the area’s fragmented expatriates, generates emotional shockwaves that turn them into news junkies. Escalating violence also appears to feed what many describe as a sense of isolation and powerlessness to help loved ones back home. Few Israelis who immigrate immediately join local synagogues.

“Everything that happens there is more troubling and stressful because we can’t send support,” says Limor Barkol, 50, of Cypress, who is the Hebrew coordinator for Rancho Santa Margarita’s Morasha Jewish Day School. She and her husband, Mony, both Israelis, immigrated in 1979 so that he could take advantage of an industrial design major at California State University Long Beach.

“All my friends were going to come for one year,” she recalled. In retrospect, she sees that attitude stalled their acclimating, particularly by refraining from learning English. “I was never with my suitcase by the door, but it took a lot of effort to feel comfortable.”

Batel Yehezkel and her husband, Shaul, of Irvine agree. “For a long time we lived with the idea we will return to Israel,” said Batel Yehezkel, 33, a curriculum coordinator at the county’s Bureau of Jewish Education, who is expecting their third child in October.

She reversed course when litigation in Israel reportedly revealed that apparent political corruption contributed to the death of her sister in a 1995 rock concert stampede. “The Israel we grew up in is no longer there,” she said. “We don’t love it enough to go back and live there.”

Tami Kalinsky, 46, of Irvine, who immigrated with her husband in 1982, remembers walking into a supermarket and opening her purse, a standard security precaution in Israel. “But nobody was there,” she said. Kalinsky feels conflicted about continuing to live in the United States while her family remains in Israel.

“People there get used to it; it’s a lifestyle for them now.” She expresses her support by buying Israeli goods from an Irvine Iranian market and a Tustin kosher market, even when her cupboards are stocked.

“I feel so torn between the way of life I chose and being with my own in Israel,” said 50-year-old Yael Weinberger of Laguna Beach, who in 1979 met and later married British-born Gareth Butler. Weinberger, who teaches Hebrew at two county synagogues, sees little recourse for her choice, which she describes as akin to reneging on a patriotic debt. “I’ve learned to live with conflict,” she said.

Israelis in Orange County Read More »

The Public Opinion War

Leave a Comment / Israel, Worldwide /

There’s the diplomatic front, the PR war and the actual battlefield.

Now the Middle East conflict is also playing out in the American street. For months, pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups have demonstrated with some regularity in New York and other cities nationwide.

The street activism reached a crescendo in the past two weeks.

On April 15, more than 100,000 pro-Israel supporters poured into Washington for a rally that was said to be the largest ever on behalf of the 54-year-old Jewish state.

Then on April 20, tens of thousands of "anti-war, anti-racism" protesters converged on the nation’s capital — the media said it was between 35,000 and 50,000 — in defense of the Palestinians, against the campaign in Afghanistan and against the assault reportedly in the works for Iraq. Another rally that day in San Francisco reportedly drew between 30,000 and 50,000, and several others took place across the country.

And on April 22, outside the annual conference of the influential pro-Israel lobby, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, several hundred Palestinians, socialists and environmental activists chanted slogans such as "Long live the intifada" and demanded that the United States staunch the flow of military aid to Israel.

The real prize at stake: American public opinion, and ultimately, U.S. policy in the Middle East.

Even with much of the Third World, the United Nations and Western Europe solidly behind the Palestinians, it’s clear that the position of the United States is the only position that truly matters. Pro-Israel advocates say the United States is proving itself to be Israel’s "indispensable ally" now more than ever.

Which is worrying the other side.

The United States has become the main player on the international stage, Edward Said, a Columbia University professor and a member of the Palestine National Council, wrote recently in the London-based Arabic daily Al Hayat.

"However, we have never realized the importance of methodical organization of political work on a popular level, in an effort to bring about a situation in which the ordinary American does not immediately think of ‘terrorism’ whenever he hears the word ‘Palestinian.’ This kind of work provides real protection for the gains achieved on the ground through our resistance to Israeli occupation."

While pro-Palestinian advocates like Said bemoan the inadequate level of pro-Palestinian organization here in the United States, Jewish observers note with admiration and worry the huge strides made toward leveling the playing field.

There was a time when the American Jewish activism reigned supreme.

Yet, as the Arab and Muslim American population has grown in this country, these groups have observed how certain pressure groups got their points across.

"Many in the Arab and Palestinian American community have been wise to learn from the history of activism in this country, whether for good causes or bad, if it was against Vietnam or South Africa’s apartheid, or for Zionism," said Mazin Qumsiyeh, a co-founder and spokesman for Al-Awda, the Palestinian Right to Return Coalition, which has been involved in organizing numerous pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

With that wisdom has come greater savviness in public advocacy, say some Jewish observers.

For example, pro-Palestinian demonstrators are trying to appeal to a wider swath of society by portraying the conflict as one that transcends politics and land, and is more about fighting racism and defending human rights.

The Palestinian cause is "not about two sides, not about two tribes, but clearly an issue between those who care about human rights vs. a small and getting-smaller group of people who think tribal," said Qumsiyeh, a geneticist at Yale University, characterizing Israel supporters in the latter group.

In many ways, pro-Palestinian activists now match the Jewish community move for move: a flurry of large newspaper ads published by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in April in The New York Times, Washington Post and International Herald Tribune seemed to be a page taken from the Jewish playbook.

Sometimes, they also succeed in putting the Jewish community on the defensive: Jewish students are now struggling to counter Arab and Muslim activists who recently launched on several university campuses a campaign to divest from Israel, similar to that taken during the 1980s against South Africa.

What prevents their message from penetrating a wider audience, pro-Palestinian activists routinely say, is "Zionist influence" over the media and lawmakers. Jewish leaders, not surprisingly, disagree.

"They are trying to emulate the example set by American Jews, whether in the streets or other means, but there’s a fundamental misunderstanding on their part," said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, which was a co-organizer of the April 15 rally.

"The American people support us because they agree with us. And the congressional leadership comes to our rallies, not theirs, because at ours, everyone supports the administration."

In contrast, he said, they criticize the administration, and what they say is not in sync with the view of the lawmakers and "what is seen as America’s interest."

More effective than the activists on the ground, Hoenlein said, are the Arab spokespeople who appear frequently on CNN and speak directly to viewers. Hoenlein conceded, though, that pro-Palestinian supporters in America have gained the upper hand on college, and even high school, campuses.

To a large degree, it seems, anyone who cares about what happens in the Middle East likely has his or her mind made up about who’s to blame. Polls in the United States seem to bear that out. Over the years, they have shown consistently stronger support for Israel, and the intifada hasn’t changed it dramatically. But there are other tangible reasons for such rallies.

Primarily, they’re aimed at attracting media attention, in hopes of snatching air time on the 6 o’clock news or some ink in the next day’s paper. In fact, a rally’s success is often gauged not by attendance, but by the amount of media coverage it garnered.

The Public Opinion War Read More »

The Best Defense: U.S.A.

Leave a Comment / Israel, Worldwide /

The Jewish world is trembling. Ask American Jews who would ordinarily be visiting Israel. Ask college students who want to spend a year in Jerusalem, or out-of-business hotel owners in Tel Aviv. Ask the average Israeli who hesitates when entering a cafe, stepping on a bus or visiting a mall. Ask the one in 10 Israeli citizens currently out of work. Ask the Argentine Jew who might otherwise move to Israel but prefers to stay put. Or the French Jew whose synagogue has been bombed, while a rabid anti-Semite finishes second in a presidential election.

For the first time in decades, people are beginning to talk seriously about Israel’s ability to survive. Not coincidentally, for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union, people are worried about genuine anti-Semitism. But the hatred is spewing from the West, not the East, reviving stark images of the 1930s.

The natural response of most American Jews in this time of crisis is to rally to Israel’s defense. But the best defense of Israel may ultimately be our support for a credible and productive U.S. role in the Middle East, one that will only benefit Israel’s security interests.

As the leaders of an American population that strongly supports Israel, how will we enable President Bush to define America’s role as a mediator? Some in the American Jewish community have reacted negatively to Bush’s recent diplomatic initiative. Many see a divine injustice in offering the Palestinians anything when all they have offered is violence. Critics feel the president is hypocritically rewarding terrorism, a move that will ultimately sacrifice Israeli security. They argue that Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority, like Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, must be crushed through military force.

But following the Afghanistan model will not work to Israel’s benefit. While Afghanistan harbored international terrorists that waged war on the West, the Palestinian territories are home to an entire people whose political status is still undecided. That is why every attempt to further isolate Arafat through force only makes him stronger. In contrast, only a small minority in Afghanistan mourned Bin Laden’s defeat.

Bush realizes that Israel cannot win this war the same way America won in Afghanistan. Even those who support military activity against the Palestinians admit there is no military solution to the conflict. Simply put, tanks and helicopters cannot permanently defeat suicide bombs.

The relative pause in the weeks following Operation Defensive Shield should fool no one. Terror may have been delayed, but only a political solution will put an end to the problem.

Despite this dismal reality, some have no appetite for the diplomatic horizons Bush seeks to offer. They spoke clearly at the April 15 Israel solidarity rally, when the representative of the administration, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, was nearly booed off the platform for voicing sympathies with ordinary Palestinians.

Bush’s choice to send Wolfowitz, both a staunch Israel supporter and a leading advocate of action against Iraq, reflected the unique foreign policy dilemma now facing the White House. At both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, sympathy for Israel is unequivocal; no one questions Bush’s commitment to the security of America’s most important Middle East ally. But the entire Arab world is ablaze in opposition to current Israeli policies regarding the territories, and America simply cannot ignore the threat posed to our key Arab allies.

The fall of these friendly regimes to hostile fundamentalists would mean the end of even a modicum of stability in the Middle East. It would certainly jeopardize Israel if hostile regimes develop weapons of mass destruction amid intensified regional turmoil. Furthermore, any plans for regime change in Iraq would be shelved indefinitely. As the crisis continues, the only winner is Saddam Hussein, who continues to openly sponsor suicide terror and enjoys each day the United States is diverted by an angry Arab world.

These are the scariest times Jews have seen in decades. There may be no solution for an ageless anti-Semitism, but there is one way to secure an Israeli future free of Palestinian terrorism — enabling President Bush to lead the parties to a political agreement. As the president proved in leading both sides to a resolution of the impasse in Ramallah, negotiations are still possible. They do not necessitate a capitulation to terror, nor will they entail sacrificing Israeli security. Returning to negotiating means acknowledging that a purely military approach to the Palestinians will condemn the region to eternal conflict, and sentence world Jewry to never-ending fear.

The best hope for avoiding disaster, and for true Israeli security, is an active and credible role for the United States in a political process. In its moment of fear and anxiety, the American Jewish community can enable progress by lending its support to the president in his current efforts. Indeed, we should be encouraging the United States to take a more active role, not discouraging U.S. diplomatic efforts that will benefit the state of Israel.

The Best Defense: U.S.A. Read More »

Questioning Sharon

Leave a Comment / Israel, Worldwide /

Since Israel launched Operation Protective Wall five weeks ago, rabbis and lay leaders of national and regional Jewish organizations throughout the United States have urged American Jews to stand with Israel and express their steadfast support for its leaders. Even those American Jewish leaders who have been critical of Israeli government action in the past have suspended their criticism of Israel in the name of unity.

Disgusted with Yasser Arafat’s duplicity and his rejection of ostensibly generous territorial concessions reported to have been offered at Camp David, liberals such as Alan Dershowitz and Arthur Hertzberg have joined the leaders of mainstream groups like American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations and the Anti-Defamation League in rallying on Israel’s behalf. With a few notable exceptions, liberals have endorsed Ariel Sharon’s policy of incursions into the West Bank and defended this policy against its many critics in the United Nations, the European Union and even the Bush administration.

There is a long Jewish tradition of "circling the wagons" in periods of crisis. At a time when Israelis are afraid to step on a bus or go to a movie and Jews in Europe face burned synagogues and violent assaults, it is tempting to put aside our differences and criticisms in the name of the time-honored principal of kol Yisra’el ‘arevim zeh ba-zeh (all Jews are responsible for one another).

American Jewish leaders must not succumb to this temptation. Critical thinking and clear-headed analyses of Israel’s long-term interests are needed now more than ever. Sadly, many of our rabbis and lay leaders appear to have sacrificed these interests for the sake of easy gestures of solidarity and unity.

Those who have called for American Jews to stand with Israel in its hour of need argue that Israel’s very existence is threatened by the wave of terror unleashed by Arafat, and that the current Israeli policy of military incursions into the West Bank is the only way to eliminate the "terrorist infrastructure" responsible for the murder of many innocent men, women and children in Israel. This policy is justified, they tell us, because every nation has a right to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks.

And yet as many Israeli security experts, generals and journalists have noted, Operation Protective Wall is liable to lead to more suicide bombings, not fewer. The Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) assault in Jenin, Nablus, Ramallah and other towns and villages in the occupied territories has only created more hatred, despair and desire for revenge. The number of desperate, enraged Palestinians who are willing to blow themselves up has surely tripled during the last three weeks.

The most recent suicide bombings indicate that all of Israel’s military might cannot stop fanatics from making their way into Israel. What use are Merkava tanks and F-16s when the only "terrorist infrastructure" required for a devastating attack against Israeli citizens is explosives and a volunteer to make the short walk from Qalqiliya to Kfar Sava?

It is also clear that as horrifying and demoralizing as suicide bombings are, they pose no threat to the existence of Israel. The IDF is much stronger than any army in the region, and for all of the world’s criticism, no country with existing diplomatic relations has cut them off, let alone threatened to launch a war. Indeed, many Arab countries recently offered to normalize relations with Israel in exchange for a full withdrawal from the occupied territories. Moreover, the Jewish state still has privileged trading relations with the United States and the European Union.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s policy is aimed not at defending Israel’s existence or "uprooting terrorism." Rather, he hopes to prevent the establishment of a viable Palestinian state by creating "buffer zones" around populated areas of the West Bank and replacing Arafat with a leader more to his liking. To this end, Operation Protective Wall was launched to eliminate the implements and symbols of Palestinian independence. How else to explain the destruction of water and electricity supplies (and the offices which supervised them), the Palestinian Authority police (responsible for imposing order and reigning in terrorists in any future settlement), cultural institutions, even the studio where Palestinians and Israelis co-produced an Arabic-language version of "Sesame Street"?

While there has been no shortage of Israeli critics who have challenged the wisdom of his current policies, American Jewish leaders from across the political spectrum have contented themselves with expressions of support and unity, rather than asking hard questions: Who will fight terrorism after the IDF eliminates all the Palestinian police units? How will Israel’s campaign against the entire Palestinian population help against terrorism? How will it advance peace, or at least the security of Israelis?

What is needed now are not empty expressions of solidarity, but rather the mobilization of wisdom and common sense directed toward a long-term strategy to end the occupation and establish secure borders. Anything less is an abdication of responsibility — and of Jewish values as well.

Questioning Sharon Read More »

The Price of Unpopularity

Leave a Comment / Israel, Worldwide /

How fleeting is the world’s fancy.

Less than two years ago, Israel seemed to be riding a wave of international popularity.

After years of international criticism, Israel had managed to regain the moral high ground in its struggle with the Arab world by withdrawing from southern Lebanon and making a sweeping peace offer that had "unmasked" Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat as an insincere peace partner.

Now, Israel’s military success in its recent Operation Protective Wall has left it more internationally isolated than at any time since the 1982 Lebanon War.

Israel’s quarrel with the United Nations over a fact-finding team seeking to investigate the battle in the Jenin refugee camp — a team whose arrival was canceled this week — is a measure of mutual mistrust. And the fact that the team was set up in the first place shows just how isolated Israel has become.

The speed with which Israel’s diplomatic position has collapsed offers a sobering lesson about the international reality — and raises serious questions for Israeli leaders who formulate policy with an eye to the international repercussions.

Just 21 months ago, it seemed that then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak had removed the twin causes of years of international reproach — Israel’s occupation of a security zone in southern Lebanon and its denial of Palestinian self-determination in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

How, in less than two years, has Israel once again become an international pariah?

In May 2000, Barak pulled Israeli forces in Lebanon back to the U.N.-certified border. In July, at the Camp David summit, he offered the Palestinians a state in Gaza and virtually all of the West Bank, with eastern Jerusalem as its capital.

The Palestinians said no, and launched a terrorist campaign against Israel with no clear political agenda.

Yet it is Israel that finds itself denounced and isolated in much of the world, with the Europeans considering economic sanctions, the United Nations voting to send a mission to probe Israel’s moral conduct and the international community contemplating the dispatch of armed forces to impose a peace.

In effect, Israel’s effort to court world opinion has backfired dramatically.

After years of U.N. hostility toward Israel — including a 1975 resolution denigrating Zionism as racism — Barak carefully won U.N. confirmation that Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon was complete to the last inch.

That, Barak believed, would form the basis of Israel’s new deterrent policy against Syria, Lebanon and Hezbollah: If they violated the internationally recognized border, Israel would have the world’s backing for tough retaliatory measures.

Israel’s hopes for fair treatment have been dashed, however: The international community has been largely silent as Hezbollah has continued to stage cross-border attacks and has kidnapped and killed Israeli soldiers — yet Israeli retaliation has been condemned for escalating the situation.

Barak also believed he had gained the moral high ground in the conflict with the Palestinians by making an unprecedentedly generous peace offer, which was rejected and repaid with violence.

Barak was sure the world would see who wanted peace and who didn’t, but it didn’t work that way: Ironically, by resorting to terror, Arafat was able to recapture the moral high ground. Palestinian violence seemed to imply a legitimate and desperate struggle for national liberation, no matter what Israel had offered and Arafat rejected.

When the Israeli army took counter-measures, the perception around the world was of the Israeli Goliath persecuting the Palestinian David.

Yet the sea change in international opinion came with the election of Ariel Sharon as prime minister in February 2001. Almost immediately there were moves to initiate a lawsuit against Sharon for his alleged role in the 1982 massacre of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps by Maronite Christian forces, when Sharon was Israel’s defense minister.

The subliminal message from Sharon’s adversaries was that Israel was now a "war criminal."

Israel’s position was further undermined when Sharon made it clear that he would not go as far as Barak to placate the Palestinians. Israel could now be portrayed as power-driven, unwilling to compromise and willing to use force to maintain its occupation and settlements.

There also was an inherent contradiction in Sharon’s strategy against the intifada: His initial tactic was to exert as much diplomatic and military pressure as he could on Arafat to get him to stop the violence.

But the more military pressure Israel exerted, the more international criticism it drew. Diplomatic pressure on Arafat dissipated, as many argued that he couldn’t be expected to meet his anti-terror commitments when his regime itself seemed to be under Israeli attack.

Israel received some international sympathy when it restrained itself in the face of terrorist attacks, but at the untenable cost of ever-increasing civilian casualties.

Amos Oz, one of Israel’s leading novelists, distinguishes between the "two wars" that Israel and the Palestinians are fighting.

One is to end Israeli occupation, and in this war, Oz says, right is on the Palestinian side. The other war is over Israel’s very existence, and in that war right is on Israel’s side. The Palestinians and Israelis, he believes are fighting both of these wars simultaneously.

After the terror attacks of Sept. 11, America tends see to the conflict in terms of Israel struggling for survival against nihilistic terror. Europe, under the weight of a heady combination of Holocaust guilt, colonial history and acute sensitivity to individual rights, tends to see Israel using force to maintain occupation.

The Palestinians have been able to exploit their portrayal of Israel as a cruel occupying power to the hilt — and Israeli officials charge that the United Nations has been a willing accomplice.

Literature and rhetoric at the U.N.-sponsored World Conference Against Racism in South Africa last summer was reminiscent of the 1975 resolution denigrating Zionism as racism — and even of the Nazis’ anti-Semitic propaganda.

Insidiously, says Israel’s deputy foreign minister, Rabbi Michael Melchior, it is not only Israel’s presence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that is being delegitimized, but the Jewish state’s very right to exist. That feeling now underlies some of the virulently anti-Israel — and occasionally anti-Semitic — coverage in the European media.

Israeli officials who had hoped that U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan would augur a more even-handed approach have been disappointed.

Israeli officials are convinced that the Jenin fact-finding team, if it does come, will not give them a fair hearing. They point to three other U.N. missions in the last two years that issued scathing criticism of Israel, while making virtually no mention of the Palestinian role in the crisis.

Can Israel do anything to turn the tide?

Barak thinks it can. He argues that Sharon now must put forward a convincing peace plan, or "face the risk of losing legitimacy.” Barak advocates dismantling remote settlements and withdrawing unilaterally from more than 80 percent of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in order to regain the moral high ground.

But that raises a key question: Would a major unilateral move change Israel’s international standing in the face of the Palestinians’ moral onslaught? Indeed, would a withdrawal even to the pre-1967 lines be enough?

Or would Israel just be risking its security to win international sympathy that would prove, in the future, equally evanescent?

This is one of the crucial dilemmas facing Israeli politicians on the left and right today.

The Price of Unpopularity Read More »

Year Abroad?

Leave a Comment / Worldwide /

After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, David Novak reassessed his life and decided to become a rabbi.

The 39-year-old Novak, who lives in Los Angeles, opted to leave his longtime career in public relations and was accepted to the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR).

But immediately he was plunged into another decision affected by terrorism — what to do about the school’s mandatory year in Jerusalem, a city devastated by suicide bombings.

With HUC-JIR considering whether or not to move the required program elsewhere or allow students not to go, Novak, like many of his classmates, feels conflicted about the coming year. On one hand, he’s apprehensive at the prospect of living in Jerusalem and never knowing whether it is safe to get on a bus or go to a cafe. On the other hand, he says, "I don’t want to sound like I’m a whiny American unsympathetic to the people who live in Jerusalem and Haifa and Netanya, for whom Israel is their home. I’m being asked to go study in Israel. I’m not being asked to go fight."

HUC-JIR is the only North American seminary to require all students to spend their first year in Israel. It also is the only one with such a centrally located campus — close to downtown Jerusalem. But unlike students at the other seminaries, such as the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC) or the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS), where rules about Israel study are more flexible and exemptions easier to obtain, the HUC-JIR students are awaiting word from the administration. HUC-JIR has already postponed the start of its fall semester to late August from July. The school’s president, Rabbi David Ellenson, says they expect to announce in early June whether the program will be in Jerusalem, as usual; at another Israeli location, or at one of the HUC campuses in the United States.

HUC leaders are well aware of the potential fallout if they move their program out of Israel. The Reform movement came under fire from many Israelis and other Jewish groups last year for canceling its summer teen trips to Israel. But HUC is also facing pressure from the other side, with many incoming students and their families expressing strong reservations about going to Israel. One student even opted for another seminary in order to avoid the Israel requirement, Ellenson said.

"We have a commitment to stand in solidarity with the people of Israel and the state of Israel, and a moral commitment to be concerned for the lives of our students and their families," Ellenson said.

Shortly after the suicide bombing at a Passover seder in Netanya, the seminary allowed this year’s students to come home early, a few weeks before the semester’s end. Twenty students opted to accept the offer.

The University of Judaism’s rabbinical school, which is also Conservative, issued a letter in April allowing students to choose whether or not to spend their third year in Israel or to defer their year in Israel to the following year. This year, all 10 third-year students went to Israel and stayed for the entire year. None of next year’s 11 students have opted to defer yet, although the school is not expecting final decisions until July and August.

RRC sent 13 students to Israel this year, one of whom came home early, and is not certain how many will go next year. The school also recently decided to pay for students to take cabs in Israel, and relocating costs if students opted to return home mid-year.

JTS sent 16 rabbinical students to Israel this year, and granted exemptions to nine. Rabbinical or cantorial students have until mid-May to file Israel exemption requests. The school also had to cancel its cantorial program in Israel, due to a large number of students requesting exemptions after the suicide bombing at Sbarro’s pizzeria. The program, which is for first-year students, is in peril this year as well — with only five students signed up to go.

Year Abroad? Read More »

My Mommy Dearest

Leave a Comment / Family, Singles /

As an unintended consequence of writing this column, I am in my mother’s dog house. I have reported in these pages on my own failings, my father’s shortcomings, my sister’s eccentricities, the foibles of two cousins and the generally bad behavior of several friends. To date, however, my only reference to my own mother has been that she thinks ski clothes make you look fat.

"That woman," as we lovingly refer to her, has thus far escaped my journalistic opprobrium, and she is deeply disappointed. She hates to think that there is a party going on somewhere and her invitation got lost in the mail. She is hurting for ink. I want to do right by her. She is, after all, my mother, and I’ve known her practically all my life.

I could paint a caricature of her as a Jewish mother stepping out of a Woody Allen movie or a Philip Roth novel, complaining and controlling in equal doses, but that’s too easy. Many jokes have been made about these people, but I don’t think they are funny. Not one bit. I am going to delete all those e-mails, and so should you.

My mother does not disapprove of things. She is much, much better than that. She doesn’t have to say a word. Instead, she gives "The Face," which consists of several muscle groups working together — lips purse, nostrils flare, eyebrows arch, eyes widen and brow furrows. All of these happen instantaneously and simultaneously when something is "not right," often accompanied by a telling nod of the head, the kind one might use at Sotheby’s. My sister swears she once saw mom raise her right eyebrow completely over the back of her head. Anything is possible with that woman.

The Face brooks no disagreement. The Face is not open to appeal. Save your breath, Perry Mason. Tell it to the hand, because The Face ain’t listening.

I’d love to get her in a poker game.

I am not necessarily seeking my mother’s approval but, much as I hate to admit it, The Face turns out to be right a disproportionate percentage of the time. Like 97 percent. The problem is that she seems to be getting right more often as I get older — and I know she ain’t getting any hipper. The only good news is that everyone I’ve talked to about this says their mother (or wife) has a Face. If misery loves company, I take solace in knowing I am not alone.

She’s getting better, sort of. My sister was house hunting recently and mom went along. They saw a dozen places, one of which was a possibility. Julie asked her opinion. "I don’t want to be judgmental," she began.

"You? Now? For 40 consecutive years you were remarkably free with your opinion. I didn’t necessarily want to hear it — in fact I never wanted to hear it — but now that I’m asking for your opinion in a life-altering situation, you suddenly don’t want to be judgmental?"

You will believe me when I tell you she’s a bit of a nut job, but a loveable one (think of Gracie Allen). Mom let Keith Richards try on one of her diamond earrings at a dinner. Today, my mother gave me a can of chicken broth and a mango. She practically threw them at me as I beat a hasty retreat to my car and yelled, "We have chicken broth in the 323 area code, mother!"

I recently met a friend who had just come from seeing the ballet. I told him, "I don’t get the ballet. It’s not like a basketball game; no one is trying to stop them. There’s no opposition; there’s no enemy." My friend took a moment and explained that, "the enemy is ugliness. The opposition is gracelessness. Look around you."

Ballanchine famously said, "Ballet is women," but I think he specifically meant my mother. My mother is the ballet. She is graciousness personified. Her political platform is beauty. Her religion is kindness. You don’t want to challenge that woman to a gracious face-off. She writes thank-you notes to people who send her thank-you notes. She has been known to give presents to people on her birthday.

She is the first to arrive when someone is in the hospital, armed with flowers and a smile. If someone passes away, she shows up like Mary Poppins, with a platter from Nate ‘n’ Al’s. She is an army of one, a friend in need and in deed.

A friend of hers has Alzheimer’s disease. It is, of course, a terrible thing to see this person deteriorate. Mom turned to me and said, "if it comes to that, please shoot me."

"Okay," I said, nonchalantly. "I’m free around 3 o’clock."

My Mommy Dearest Read More »

Conservation and Appreciation

Leave a Comment / Torah /

I learned of the Jewish slant on conservation on my first flight to Israel in my late teens. Fate would have it that I was seated next to a very dignified and sage-looking haredi gentlemen. He was quite pleased, since he would not have to fend off small talk about soccer teams with some sabra from Tel Aviv. I was less pleased, since I would be forced to be on best behavior, even before arriving at my yeshiva destination.

I probably learned more on that flight than during the next month in yeshiva. I observed up-close the conduct of a Torah scholar (he was one of the heads of a large and prestigious yeshiva in Jerusalem) — his constant smile, his inner joy, the immediacy of his connection to God.

What lasted the longest, however, was his minilecture about sugar packets.

When the flight attendants came around with the post-coffee refuse bag, the rabbi made sure to rescue the sugar from an ignominious end. "Sugar is such a wonderful gift!" he quickly explained. "God is so good to give it to us. How can we trivialize it by treating it as trash?"

His interest was not in recycling, preserving resources or contributing to a global garbage disposal problem. He was concerned with the sludge deposited upon our personalities when we take things for granted.

I was impressed at the time, but it took many years to appreciate that he had alerted me to one of the most attractive elements of Jewish life.

Members of other faiths are frequent guests at my Shabbat table They are fascinated with Shabbat itself, to be sure. All the stereotypes about a spiritless and slavish devotion to a cold law vanish with the songs and the spirit, while my wife has Wolfgang Puck beat badly by the time the second course comes along.

They are most fascinated, however, by "Brachot," by the variegated and nuanced system of blessings pronounced before eating different foods. Thanking God before eating is hardly something foreign to the Christian visitors. They are intrigued, however, by the questions that the children ask about which blessing to recite, whether one blessing "counts" for two kinds of food, whether they have eaten enough for an after-blessing. Isn’t it enough just to say "thank you" to God?

Jews don’t just acknowledge — they take inventory. They notice the fine detail in a gift. Thus, they demand different blessings for all sorts of foods, making them more conscious of the specialness of everything in God’s creation. The different blessings on produce of the ground and produce of the trees sensitizes us to the fact that God could sustain us by feeding us nothing but plastic airline food. In a world without the variety God created, we wouldn’t even know the difference. Blessings, in their complexity, make us aware of the quality of divine gifts, not just their existence.

In this week’s portions, God spells out the consequences to the Jewish people for obedience and disobedience to divine law. Rashi seems to turn around the plain meaning of the text that pledges, "You will eat your bread to satiety" (Leviticus 26:5). He comments, "You will eat a little, and it will be blessed within you." The Divine blessing is not in the bounty, Rashi implies, but in our ability to be nourished, satisfied and pleased by eating very little. This is indeed strange after the text explicitly speaks of truly bountiful harvests of plentiful food.

Rabbi Eli Munk, former chief rabbi of Paris, explains that satisfaction with little is a Jewish necessity, even in times of plenty. The quintessential Jewish reaction to a bumper crop is to share as much of it as possible with other peoples and nations. We should expect to limit our intake to improve the lot of others.

Such an ethic is hard to promote in a society that delights in the quick disposal of anything not needed at the moment, whether sugar packets, plastic dinnerware, broken VCRs or spouses who have aged. Might part of the fix not lie in the old system of blessings, which force us to look life squarely in the eye, and take note of how rich and beautiful it is, and how much we owe to God?

So if conservation is on your mind, think of the Jewish way: count your blessings.

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The Sabra Kosher Gourmet

Leave a Comment / Food, Israel, Travel /

In late February, I went to Israel at the invitation of the Ministry of Tourism. Having studied abroad in Jerusalem between intifadas, I thought I had seen the attractions and sites of the land, but the ministry offered a view a student on a budget never imagined: Gourmet Israel, eight days of cutting-edge kosher restaurants and winery tours. I jumped at the chance. With El Al’s help, I actually flew at the chance.

The nightly news, even before the violence became a full-blown war, kept the group small. Only three others joined our merry band of foodies in the Holy Land. With a wonderful tour guide (Judy Goldman, who co-wrote Joan Nathan’s first cookbook) and our driver, Nisso, we set a table for six.

We traveled for a taste of what Israel stands to lose most immediately. We sipped excellent local wines at fine restaurants — quiet, empty restaurants. Everyday life is disappearing from Israel. At every stop, Israelis marveled that we Americans were there at all. How brave we are. No, we told them, we’re on a fancy vacation, living better here than at home. Tell a friend, they said. Send more tourists.

In Jerusalem as across the country, strings of shops and restaurants are "closed for remodeling." Many, if not most, will neither remodel nor reopen their doors. Still, there is much to see, even for the veteran Israel tourist. Yes, the holy sites and archeological wonders will still be around (we pray) when the current round of fighting is done. But much of what I saw, the life-affirming and luxurious best of Israel, already is in danger of disappearing.

The treasures of Jerusalem go beyond the Wall and the ancient and holy sites. There is life unique to contemporary Jerusalem. Even more than the Chihuly glass sculpture exhibit last year at the Tower of David, the Davidson Visitor Center, south of the Western Wall, illuminates every cliche about Israel’s clash of the most ancient and modern wonders. In a plaza next to the remains, the Davidson center features a UCLA-designed virtual reality tour of the Second Temple’s magnificent arches and stairways and plazas.

Of course, we ate. Of many meals in varied, unique (and financially endangered) restaurants in town, my favorite was Eucalyptus, in Safra Square (next to City Hall) on Jaffa Road, walking distance from the Ben Yehuda shops. Chef-owner Moshe Basson’s passion for Israeli cuisine makes his small restaurant a must-eat destination for food lovers (see sidebar). Basson serves dishes based on the food of biblical times, made with ingredients so fresh we spent an afternoon watching him pick our meal from the Judean Hills.

A Eucalyptus meal is special; a meal you can’t get outside Israel. The tehina and date syrup dessert plate, called dibs, is a goopy-sweet liquid halvah worth a trip to Israel by itself. Eucalyptus also makes and bottles its own liqueurs, including a strong, smoky licorice arak that goes perfectly with the dibs.

You can find Eucalyptus in Israeli travel guides, but for less-traveled roads you’ll want a tour guide. Goldman, our gourmet guide, was up to the task of sniffing out the best in Israel. Not just any guide, much less a tour book, can lead you through the winding dirt and gravel roads of the Judean Hills to the extraordinary cheesemaker Shai Zeltzer.

In a cave on a goat farm on a green and boulder-strewn patch of Jerusalem hill, Zeltzer is making an international name for Israeli cheeses. With flowing robes and a long white beard, Zeltzer dresses in a Bedouin style, but his casual warmth and Yiddish-laced sense of humor show him up as a uniquely Israeli sort of hippie. Zeltzer sells his cheeses on Fridays and Saturdays only. As we sat, sipping tea and tasting a dozen of his sharp, pungent cheeses, a steady trickle of in-the-know Jerusalemites parked their cars next to the goat pen and ducked into the cool cave where Zeltzer has his counter.

Our time in Jerusalem, in February, was warm and sunny. At night, we watched the news to see where violence had struck, just as we would at home. Then we called our loved ones to let them know that life goes on in Israel; that we were safe and very well fed.

Taking our fill of cheeses and biblical cuisine, we ruefully decamped from the King David Hotel (after the breakfast buffet, of course) for a stay in the Northern Galilee.

We spent most of the next two days visiting some of Israel’s most successful wineries, which felt less like traveling 8,000 miles east, and more like 20 years back in time to the early California wine industry, when grape-loving microclimates first met the will of adventurous vintners and the capital to produce world-class drink. The family owned and operated Tishbi Winery in Binyamina, near the Carmel region, just installed a beautiful picnic-like tasting area. At the Amiad Winery, on Kibbutz Amiad in the Galilee Hills, they add new varieties seasonally to a strong collection of fruit wines and liqueurs. And our hardy group stood for a marathon tasting session at Golan Heights Winery, a massive operation with vinyards all across the country, where they produce the Yarden, Gamla, Golan and Hermon wines.

After a quick stop in Tiberias and dinner at the dramatic tented meat palace Decks, we spent our last few days in Tel Aviv. At trendy Lilit, a restaurant just off Rothschild, we met Janna Gur, editor of the Israeli gourmet magazine Al Ha Shulchan (On the Table). We talked about the Israeli wine expo her magazine would sponsor that weekend, the first ever all-Israeli wine exhibit. Thirty-five wineries would offer their spirits to the discriminating nose and lips of Israel’s aesthetes. We talked about Israel’s developing wine culture and, as we ordered dessert, Gur explained why even in the midst of rising violence, she would stake her career on gourmet food and drink. "It takes years go from a first planting to a bottle of wine," she said, "To be a winemaker, you have to be an optimist."

The waiters brought dessert, a mascarpone cheesecake. It was sweet. And it did not last long.

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Give a Fig!

Leave a Comment / Food, Israel, Travel /

One of the most memorable dishes I enjoyed in Israel was chicken-stuffed figs in tamarind sauce, at chef Moshe Basson’s Eucalyptus restaurant in Jerusalem. Tamarind concentrate is sold in blocks at Asian markets. To save time, you could use ground chicken or turkey.

Moshe Basson’s Chicken-Stuffed Figs

  • 2 tablespoons olive oil

  • 2 medium onions, finely chopped

  • 2 chicken breasts, finely chopped

  • 3/4 teaspoons freshly ground cardamom

  • 1 teaspoon ground allspice

  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon

  • Salt to taste

  • 1-2 tablespoons tamarind concentrate

  • 2 cups water

  • 2-1/2 tablespoons brown sugar

  • 24 fresh or dried figs

In a wok, heat the onion in the oil until golden brown. Add the chopped chicken breast and half of each spice, stirring well and turning until white (about three minutes). Turn out into a bowl and cool.

In the same wok, without cleaning it, add the tamarind, sugar and the remaining spices in water, stir well and bring to boil. Lower the heat and stir until sauce is smooth and velvety. Set aside.

With fresh figs, make a small incision in the upper part, so it can be closed back after stuffing. With a very small spoon, dig out the flesh and stuff the fig with about 1 tablespoon of the chicken mixture.

Take dried figs and make a small indentation in each with a finger and push in a small amount of the chicken breast mixture.

Place the figs into the sauce in the wok, cover and bring to boil. Lower the heat and boil gently for 15 minutes. Serve with white rice or couscous. Serves four.

Shakshuka a la Dr. Shakshuka

The specialty of the well-known Dr. Shakshouka restaurant in Jaffa is the egg and tomato dish that gives the establishment its name. I enjoyed this dish on my last night in Israel, a perfect finale.

  • 2 pounds fresh tomatoes, unpeeled and cut in quarters, or 28-ounce of can tomatoes

  • 6 garlic cloves, roughly diced

  • 2 teaspoons salt or to taste

  • 1 teaspoon sweet paprika

  • 2 teaspoons tomato paste

  • 1/4 cup vegetable oil

  • 6 large eggs

Place all ingredients, except the eggs, in a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer and cook uncovered over low heat until thick, for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Ladle the tomato sauce into a greased 12-inch frying pan. Bring to a simmer and break the eggs over the tomatoes. Gently break the yolks with a fork.

Cover and continue to cook for about three to four minutes, until the eggs are set. Bring the frying pan directly to the table, set on a trivet and serve. Serves six.

These recipes and others are found at
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